Free Until the Dawn's Light by Aharon Appelfeld Page A

she had said something to Blanca by chance: “Jews suffer everywhere.”
    “Why, Mama?”
    “Because they’re sensitive.”
    “More sensitive than other people?” Blanca had challenged her.
    “No. Just weaker.”
    “Strange,” Blanca had said.
    “What’s so strange?” her mother had asked.
    “That Jews are weaker.”
    “That’s how things are.”
    Blanca remembered that conversation with great clarity, perhaps because it had taken place in the evening. Her father was sitting in the armchair, and her mother had spoken slowly, as though counting her words.

19
    AS BLANCA WAS returning home toward evening, from a distance she saw a man standing in front of her door and knocking on it. First it seemed to her that it was Karl, the church beadle, who used to make the rounds before the holidays, soliciting contributions for the church. When she drew nearer, he looked to her like Dachs, her father’s former partner. But when she was only a few feet away from her house, she saw in amazement that it was her father.
    “Papa!” she called out loud.
    “I came back,” said her father. A frightened and perplexed look had hardened on his long, narrow face.
    “What’s the matter?” Something of his frozen voice clung to her.
    “I missed home,” he said, smiling.
    Now she saw: he was thin, and his posture was stooped. It was as if he had left his earthly existence in Himmelburg and had brought here only his trembling soul.
    Blanca hugged him and gathered him to her heart. “How good it is that you’ve come back,” she said.
    “I didn’t know what to do,” said her father, covering his mouth with his right hand.
    “Let’s go to My Corner.”
    “We’ll sit in your house. Why go so far?” he said, as though seeking cover.
    “Everything is neglected in the house. And there isn’t anybody in My Corner at this hour.”
    They set off for the center of town and Blanca did most of the talking, telling him about everything that had happened to her since the morning. Her father wasn’t distracted. He listened attentively, as though she were telling him secrets. When they reached the center of town, it was already three o’clock. The sun flooded the shop windows with cool light. Her father raised his eyes, as though looking away from a terrible dream, and said, “I’m so glad I came back. It’s good to return to your native city.”
    Blanca was alarmed by that sentence.
    “I have no special sentiments for this city,” she said. “There are more important things than the city you live in.”
    “What are they?” He surprised her.
    “A good feeling, for example,” she said, and she was pleased that she hadn’t been tripped up in an idle statement.
    “True, the evening light is always joyful,” he said, pausing, as though he weren’t sure of what he’d said.
    “I feel no sentiments for this city. I would gladly travel to another place.”
    “Where?” he asked with his old curiosity.
    “To Vienna, for example.”
    “I,” he said, returning to his former ways, “find our city very pleasant.”
    This was not the ill and confused father whom Blanca and Adolf had put into the old age home but, rather, the father from her childhood. He had always dreamed. Her mother loved him because he was a dreamer, and when he failed—he mainly failed—she would support him with her fragile body and envelop him with soft speech, with good food, with a new coat that she had bought him. Or she would take him out for a long walk. She was his great admirer, and she believed in his hidden talents, which would someday be discovered.
    “So, where shall we sit, Papa?”
    This time her father preferred Amnon & Tamar to My Corner. They sat in the place where they always sat, near the window, across from the acacia tree, whose leaves had fallen, revealing its sturdy trunk. They ordered coffee and cheesecake, and the waiter, who had known them for many years, said, “It’s been a long time since I’ve seen you, sir. How are